Tuesday, April 8, 2014

About That Location…

Genealogy researchers seeking the foreign origin of their
ancestors can relate to the initial joy that was mine when I stumbled upon an
accidental entry in a government document the other day. Accidental, I say, because like so
many bureaucratic forms, the line for place of birth is generally reserved for details
only if the said ancestor was actually born within that country’s domestic borders.
Let the weary pilgrim have been born elsewhere, and only the name of the
country would be the permitted birth entry.

In the case of our current Flannery pursuit, let the
ancestor be born in a town ever so humble—say, the size of tiny Paris, Ontario—and every last detail was sure to be preserved in
perpetuity. Cross those international border to get there? Sorry, no details
allowed.

Several years ago, I was the fortunate recipient of such an
error, when I uncovered the Polish origin of my paternal grandparents—all thanks
to the slip of a pen by a United States
census enumerator upon his appointed rounds in Brooklyn, New York.

Whenever something like that happens to me—and believe me,
it’s a rare occurrence—it’s cause for rejoicing. So when I stumbled upon the
digitized version of Patrick Flannery’s marriage record at Ancestry.com, it was
shoutin’ time again!

There, for place of birth of the groom, the clerk had
habitually entered the nation of birth. You could see it in the previous
entries—all labeled merely “Canada.”
Somehow, when it got to the entry for Patrick Flannery and his intended,
Margaret Gorman, her entry designated
“Ireland” for place of birth, but Patrick’s entry included just a bit more.

My joy in seeing the county of Ireland
in which Patrick’s birth occurred was short lived, though. The government
document assured me it was reported as County Roscommon, but somehow, I had my doubts.

Wouldn’t government verification be sufficient? Actually,
no. Something in the back of my mind prompted me to check some other documents
I had already uncovered. I went back to look at the very first record I had
found for Patrick: his death record following that gruesome drowning at the end
of March in 1895.

Admittedly, the death record was not a display of the
certificate, itself. It was only a transcription. But there on the record was
the place of birth again, naming not only a nation, but a county as well.

It wasn’t Roscommon.

According to the transcription, Patrick’s place of birth in Ireland was in County Tipperary.

What gives here? The two counties weren’t even contiguous—although
I do have to say, they share a common connection via the Shannon River.
I have no idea why someone who was born in one county would give an emphatic
response claiming a different county
for an official government record.

So, which report is to be believed? Normally, I would tend
to believe the earlier record, simply because it was closer to the time of the
event. Also, death records completed based on bereaved family members’ reports
are open to all sorts of understandable errors.

Before reaching a conclusion of which report to rely on, let’s
revisit the whole reason I’m toying with the roots of this particular Flannery
family: I’m hypothesizing that Patrick Flannery’s immigrant family, living so close to immigrant Margaret Flannery Tully in such a tiny village so far from
their homeland, is somehow related to our Tully line.

And I do know one thing about that Tully line: at least two
of the children of Denis and Margaret Flannery Tully were baptized in a little town called Ballina in Ireland.
And this particular Ballina happened to be located in County Tipperary.

And, now for the “ifs” that may lead us to a conclusion on
this hypothesis:

·IF
Patrick was really born in County
Tipperary

·IF
Patrick’s family was really related to Margaret Flannery Tully

·IF records
on Patrick’s Flannery family can be located in County Tipperary

…THEN perhaps I
may safely say that we have a connection between the two Flannery groups found
in that 1852 census in the little town of Paris
in the region known at that time as Ontario West.

About Me

It is my contention that, after a lifetime, one of the greatest needs people have is to be remembered. They want to know: have I made a difference?
I write because I can't keep for myself the gifts others have entrusted to me. Through what I've already been given--though not forgetting those to whom I must pass this along--from family I receive my heritage; through family I leave a legacy. With family I weave a tapestry. These are my strands.